You might try brushing a few times a day with salt and baking soda. If there isn't any mercury in your mounth, you might also consider dabbing some hydrogen peroxide on the tooth and around the gumline. Using a water pik or similiar helps a lot, you can use the water pik with dissolved salt water and baking soda too.

but anyway, that would be exactly why I won't bother changing my few remaining amalgams out. One of my extracted teeth is a victim of change already. too bad, was a nice one too.

a root canal will really help you feel yucky. I had one done, I lasted 2 months or so with it. It was like having an antenna in my mouth no kidding. I think also the chemicals, formaldehyde, all sorts of weird stuff they use with a root canal don't help much. I was ok for about a month with it then it really just drove me nuts. That tooth never had an abcess until after the root canal. Tells me something. If the pain doesn't subside within a week or two of salt water/peroxide/whatever it may be best to just extract it.

Bex, dental equipment is never truly sterile. I know some people last years with root canals, they keep the tooth but they lose their appendix or something else downline.